At least 85 fires and 39 traffic accidents were reported in Metropolitan Lima and Callao during the New Year festivities, the General Corps of Volunteer Firefighters of Peru (CGBVP) reported this Sunday.
Firefighter commander Mario Casaretto told RPP radio station that most of the fires were caused by pyrotechnic products and short circuits in ornamental lights, while traffic accidents were due to excessive alcohol consumption.
Casaretto maintained that the different volunteer companies had to deal with simultaneous fires in districts of Lima and Callao such as Ate, San Juan de Lurigancho and Ventanilla.
“The use of pyrotechnics has not stopped, it is a subject, I am sure, clandestine. After having launched these products into the air, they return like an incandescent light bulb and are positioned in spaces where there is combustible material: furniture, wood, recycling, warehouses without roofs”, he commented.
He added that they also dealt with “fires of electrical origin due to Christmas lights, which are left on and (people) go out into the street and cause overheating” of the connections.
Casaretto also explained that most of the traffic accidents that were dealt with in the last 24 hours had their origin in excessive alcohol consumption by drivers.
“It is always recommended not to drive while intoxicated or buy fireworks, but people always look for the biggest fireworks, to assemble New Year’s dolls, despite the fact that they are prohibited,” he complained.
The fire chief explained, in this regard, that during the last days of the year they fought four fires in clandestine fireworks workshops, and that 8 people died from handling these devices.
“Firefighters have followed the instructions of the commanding general, but there are eight deaths, in (the districts of) Ate, in Lurín, in Ventanilla and the list continues,” he said.
Casaretto asked, in this sense, citizens to report to the authorities the existence of clandestine fireworks workshops and called for them to stop buying these products.
“The first accomplice of a clandestine pyrotechnics workshop is the neighbor. How can I not realize that cylinders are coming down, that canes are coming down, that there is movement of merchandise that is coming out? And at the time of the fire, when the gunpowder detonates and everything there is, the first affected is the neighbor ”, he warned.